Chocolate Zucchini Muffins (Paleo, Gluten Free, Grain Free)

These paleo and gluten-free chocolate zucchini muffins are easy to make, moist, and super chocolatey! Made with simple ingredients like almond flour, shredded zucchini, cocoa powder, eggs, and coconut sugar, these healthy muffins will be a hit with your whole family!

A healthy chocolate-packed zucchini muffin!

When I’m craving dessert, I want something drop-dead simple that can be made with stuff already in my pantry—and it can’t crazily spike my blood sugar. Ding ding ding! My new chocolate zucchini muffin recipe hits the bullseye. Unlike other muffin recipes, this one doesn’t require you to squeeze out the excess moisture from the shredded zucchini or buy a bunch of different pricey flours from your local health food store. Plus, it’s a tasty way to use up all the zucchini languishing in your crisper! And did I mention there’s chocolate involved?

Almond flour chocolate zucchini muffins

You hear me right: this recipe doesn’t call for blending together a bunch of different flours. Instead, these chocolate zucchini muffins are made with just almond flour as the base. Even though I love grain-free paleo treats, I don’t have the patience, the budget, or the expandable pants required to test out every single substitution or alternative flour available. I hate wasting money on expensive flours and starches that I’ll rarely use. So any time I can create a paleo dessert recipe with just one type of flour—in this case, almond flour—I call it a day and say “you’re welcome” to my waistline.

Can you make ingredient substitutions?

Unfortunately, I’m not sure how this recipe will work with different flours or how to substitute the eggs, sweetener, etc. If you try a substitution and it works out great, please leave a note in the comments so everyone can benefit from your baking prowess.

Tips FOR MAKING the best chocolate zucchini muffins

• Use a scale to measure the dry ingredients! The most precise way to measure dry ingredients for a baking recipe is to use an accurate kitchen scale—there’s just too much variability when you rely on measuring cups to portion out ingredients for baking. That’s why I always include gram measurements in my recipe cards for baked goods—just hit the metric button in my recipe card below to convert to grams!
• No need to peel or squeeze out the zucchini! I hate messing up a clean kitchen towel or wasting paper towels by squeezing shredded zucchini in it, so if I can avoid it, I will. Besides, the extra liquid in the zucchini is perfect for giving a wonderfully moist texture to the muffins!
• Beat the eggs and coconut sugar well! Coconut sugar doesn’t dissolve easily in liquids so make sure you beat them with the eggs for a good 2 minutes. Don’t be lazy!
• Work quickly after the wet and dry ingredients are mixed! As soon as the dry and wet ingredients are combined in this muffin recipe, work quickly because the baking soda has been activated. If you dawdle, your muffins won’t rise as well in the oven!

How to make paleo chocolate zucchini muffins

Heat oven to 350°F with the rack in the middle position. While the oven is heating up, line a 12-cup muffin tin with parchment muffin liners or grease well with ghee or coconut oil.

In a medium bowl, combine the almond flour, unsweetened cocoa powder, baking soda, cream of tartar, and salt.

Whisk it all together.

In a separate large bowl, add the coconut sugar, eggs, and vanilla.

Use a hand mixer or whisk to blend together until the sugar is fully incorporated and the liquid lightens in color to a lighter brown, about 2 to 3 minutes.

Stir the grated zucchini into the bowl of wet ingredients.

And make sure the zucchini is well incorporated.

Next, add the dry almond flour ingredients to the bowl of wet ingredients and use a silicone spatula or wooden spoon to mix everything until combined. Stir in the chocolate chips.

Divide the batter evenly into each muffin liner.

Fill each muffin cup until the batter reaches about ¼ inch from the top. If desired, dot the top with additional chocolate chips.

Bake the muffins in the oven at 350°F for 25 to 30 minutes, rotating the muffin tray at the halfway mark.

The muffins are done cooking when the tops are golden brown and a toothpick inserted into the middle comes out clean.

Remove the muffins from the oven and transfer the muffins from the pan to a wire rack to cool completely.

Enjoy! You can’t even see the zucchini in there!

How to store the muffins

You can store the double chocolate zucchini muffins in a sealed airtight container in the fridge for up to a week or in the freezer for 4 months. When you want to eat a frozen muffin, you can thaw it overnight in the fridge or microwave it for 30 seconds straight from the freezer. If you’re using a countertop toaster oven to heat up a muffin, I would still thaw it first and then bake at 300°F for ~5 minutes or until heated through.